[Ssf] Including...

[Chris Malins]

Well, as I see it we have this list, SSF meetings regular, SSF meetings 
arranged specifically and the Democracy cafe to use. The Democracy cafe 
idea is good for the purely open structure, it can allow people to throw 
around a few notions with no pressure of time, no need to keep all 
present considering the same idea and without an expectation that action 
needs to be taken away from it.

It would seem to make sense that SSF meetings should be facilitated with 
some moderately enforced time constraints to deal first with specific 
ideas raised via email or other forms of contact and coming out of 
Democracy Cafes etc, but that some time should be set aside for new 
ideas to have preliminary spontaneous attention, albeit not necessarily 
resulting in any decisions. Within this structure I would suggest that 
we can remain relaxed about the minutiae of agendaing and be positive 
about arising issues which need immediate action.

Perhaps one major barrier to people committing to get involved in issues 
is that people don't want to be in the position where they let anyone 
down. I personally like to have a controllable set of responsibilities 
that I am answerable to someone or ones for, and then put extra time 
into non-committed stuff. This is not necessarily very organisationally 
efficient for the group as a whole! For instance, I could say, 'Wow Dan, 
writing stuff sounds like a good idea, I'm sure I could churn out an 
article every couple of weeks', but I don't want to get committed to 
doing something like that regularly, so instead I keep stum, and offer 
to proofread which is a clearly defined manageable task. Maybe I will 
occasionally put pen to computer screen, maybe not.

I guess that the gist is that what i want is to be able to sit back and 
contribute when I see a project that is of particular interest or fits 
my skills (which I am doing at the moment with various groups). I don't 
want to get drawn in to feeling responsible for doing stuff that I can't 
sustain, where I could be letting people down. And I suspect that plenty 
of people have the same sort of caution.


Chris

Dan wrote:
> Hi again,
> 
> Jeez, sorry for all the e-mails, but I've got one last question.
> 
> Question: what can be done to be more open and inclusive?
> 
> There are currently 40 members in total on this list, and many more 
> people 'out there' who one might imagine would want to be involved in SSF.
> 
> Stuff is generally written saying, 'please get involved / please muck 
> in' - but I get the sense that it doesn't work.
> 
> What might be the reasons for this?
> 
> To everyone else out there on this list - what would involve you?  What 
> are you looking for?  What do you want to see happening, and do you have 
> any time to contribute to making it happen?
> 
> I sometimes get confused between two opposite poles: if a meeting is 
> totally open - 'come along and bring your ideas' - the meeting can 
> drift, and people don't bring their ideas because they don't have a 
> sense of what it is.
> 
> Opposite to this is, say, me or Kev or Jase or anyone else running away 
> with their own ideas - leaving no space for input.
> 
> What can be done?
> 
> Dan
>